


The Perfect Halloween

by SAYS



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-11 06:34:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16470569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SAYS/pseuds/SAYS
Summary: For Jessi - Curiosity killed the cat, they say… could it kill a Marauder?





	The Perfect Halloween

**Author's Note:**

> I’m so very happy I had to write for you, Jessi!! Your prompts were great to work with... I just hope you’ll like how I used them. For years, you’ve been so supportive of us all, and such a great friend. Thank you, dear, and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Old Fool’s Manor (just some creepy old mansion, really)

Ten days before Halloween and getting antsy for lack of a good idea for a party…

The house was everything they had hoped for – it was old, dark… and haunted. Or so they had been told. In other words, it was perfect. Even in the fading light, it was hideous, a neo-Gothic monstrosity of broken lines and carved stones born from the nightmares of a twisted mind. The dark façade was forbidding with its tall narrow windows like so many dead black eyes and its turrets and towers like serrated blades that seemed to pierce the sunset sky and make it bleed.

As the last one of them emerged from the forest, James Potter heard an audible gulp behind him and hid a smile.

“I’m still not sure it’s a good idea,” Peter Pettigrew said in a high-pitched whisper.

“We can’t be sure before we start to explore, but it does look promising,” Remus Lupin assured him, as if he hadn’t heard the note of fear in his friend’s voice. 

“Come on, Wormtail! It’ll be fun!” Sirius Black chimed in with a nod of his head, and then he threw one arm around Peter’s shoulders to turn him fully towards the mansion. “Look at that!” There was no mistaking the excitement in his voice. “It’s exactly what we’d been searching for… and without you, we’d never have heard about it! You are a true Marauder, mate!”

Looking at Peter’s sour expression, James had to stifle a laugh and saw from the corner of his eyes that Remus could barely keep a straight face. Any other day - or night - Wormtail would have gloated. He loved to be praised. But not tonight. James wondered how many times he had had bad dreams because of this house when he was a kid.

How can a young wizard impress a young witch on Halloween? James, Sirius, Remus and Peter had been thinking about it for weeks. A few days earlier, as they were investigating the haunted houses around Hogwarts in the library, Peter had told them a story one of his great-uncles loved to tell when he was a child. It was about a Muggle, a crazy old fool who fancied himself an inventor and a mage. But he was wealthy, the kind of man who could get away with about anything at that time. He had no family, and yet he had a huge manor built in a vale hidden amongst woody hills - he needed quiet and privacy to do, well, whatever he was up to, whatever it might have been. His servants never stayed in his service for long, but they helped spread many rumors about their former employer, rumors that made Muggles shiver with fear during the long nights by the fire and the Wizards laugh. In the end, the man was rumored to have locked himself inside his home and no one had ever seen him again. Those brave enough to go near the place had reported hearing strange noises and seeing greenish lights and shapes.

“You don’t have to remind me!” Peter replied, visibly dejected, and then he sighed. “It’s probably haunted, you know…”

Sirius barked a laugh. “It better be, after all the trouble we’ve been through to get here!”

They’d had a hard time leaving the castle. As if he had sensed somewhat that they were up to something, Severus Snape had been particularly nosey for the last two days. Anywhere they went, he was almost always there. The Marauders had had to rely on their Map and on James’ Invisibility Cloak to walk right under Snivellus’ long nose. James grinned at that memory, then he grimaced; it was harder and harder for them all to hide under the Cloak, as they had grown up quite a bit in the last year – or at least Sirius and Remus had. Peter had had to turn into a rat to give more room to his friends. They had heard him grumble about it all the way from Hogwarts.

“We live in a haunted castle, Pete, so what’s the matter with you?” Remus asked. He looked genuinely baffled by Peter’s reluctance.

“Nothing… but they are the Hogwarts’ ghosts, we know them. This one was a Muggle!”

“Two words.” Sirius leaned towards Peter and whispered: “Bloody. Baron.”

Peter paled and looked around, as if he feared the Slytherin ghost had followed them there. James, Remus and Sirius laughed, and finally Peter joined in.

“That wasn’t funny,” he protested, sobering quickly.

“Was,” Sirius retorted.

“Let’s go,” James said, rolling his eyes. He started to walk towards the house to put an end to the childish squabble. Ever since they had decided to visit that place, Peter had been jumpy.  
Sirius and Remus flanked James at once; Peter mumbled something unintelligible and followed them. The closer they got to the house, the creepier it was. As they neared the front door, the moon showed up from behind the clouds, shinning down on the carvings into the dark wood and delineating grotesque demon-like creatures.

”Looks like we are welcome,” James remarked drily, and then he turned to his friends and grinned. “Ready?” Before they could say a word, he took out his wand and said: “Alohomora!”  
The big door started to swing open with something like the death rattle of a huge wooden monster.

“Lumos!”

The Marauders walked in one by one, their wands casting light inside a large hall with walls painted the color of dried blood – or so it looked. Six tall paintings were hung there, three on each side; they were typically Muggle and yet James would have sworn he could feel the eyes of the portraits following them. Or was it because there was always something scary about them? It wasn’t obvious at first sight, but one had one bright red eye, another one had something like gnarled wings protruding from its shoulders, and another still had vampire’s teeth… there were all monsters of a kind. No wonder the Muggle servants had hated it in this place; it must have been… unnerving, to say the least.

But that was then. Now, well, every surface was covered with a thick layer of dust, and dead leaves blown in by the wind through one of the broken stained glass windows crunched under their feet. Birds had built their nests in the grotesque moldings and at the top of the big frames, slowly turning the canvas into something more, er…, abstract.

James thought it was rather sad… and they weren’t here for “sad”.

“Snakes,” Sirius muttered in a disgusted tone.

James looked up at the ceiling and saw painted snakes slithering in all directions, like some weird compass rose. He almost jumped out of his skin when Peter sneezed and bit back a scathing remark. The sound seemed to echo from room to room until it filled the whole house.

“Well, if the place’s haunted, we’ll know sooner rather than later,” Remus said with a wolfish grin.

Peter cringed. “Sorry.”

James came to a halt before the stairs, guarded by stone griffins.

“Well, the guy had bad tastes, but he still had it right at times.” He nudged Sirius, who was still giving dark looks to the snakes; Sirius shrugged, not completely mollified.

“Where, now?” Peter asked, looking around.

“Since we don’t have the whole night, I suggest we split and explore each a part of the house,” James decided. “Remus, you take left and Peter right, Sirius and I will explore the second floor, he to the right and I to the left. We’ll meet up there…” He nodded towards the second floor hall. “… in thirty minutes.”

“We shouldn’t split. That’s a bad idea…” Peter started to protest.

“What if we find something?” Remus asked.

“We send our Patronus,” Sirius suggested.

They all nodded, even Peter.

“See you all in half an hour.” Remus grinned and left.

James and Sirius didn’t wait to see whether Peter was going to the right. They climbed up the stairs and separated in the second floor hall.

“Good luck, mate,” Sirius said with his back already to James.

James chuckled. “Thanks!”

He explored the floor room after room, but though he saw a guillotine - the blade was disappointedly clean, he checked - in one of them, and strange masks in another, none of them had anything really special. He was starting to believe they had been wasting their time when he found himself at the bottom of a spiral staircase and remembered the tower. He ran up the stairs two at a time.

The room at the top was crammed with all sorts of clicking and whirring artifacts. James smiled and, waving his wand, said: “Expecto Patronum!” What looked like the ghost of his Animagus form sprang out of his wand, looked at him and left to find his friends.

“Wow!” Sirius exclaimed as he joined him, soon followed by Remus and Peter. “During a few seconds, I thought this house was going to be a big disappointment, but you may have something there, Prongs.”

They started to look closer at the dusty constructs. A few were big, like the one resembling a grandfather clock but wasn’t a grandfather clock - believe it or not, it was a coconut cracker -, but most were small. The more they studied them, the less they could fathom their use. There were only a few exceptions, each one of them a nutcracker of some sort - they were the ones with bits and pieces of shells all around.

Still, they tried some more to find something, anything of interest in the piles of junks, but they were baffled by them all.

“Looks like the guy had been nuts of nuts,” James joked, grabbing something the size of a snitch. “Not what I’d expected…”

They chuckled, and James started when some sort of dart whistled past his left ear.

“Sorry!” Sirius mumbled, making a face. “Could have been worse, though…” He nodded towards the various nutcrackers.

“Ouch!” James grimaced, and then he grinned. “Well, I don’t know about you, but it’s getting uncomfortable in here.”

“Yeah, let’s go back to the castle now.” Remus sighed, finally accepting defeat.

They nodded, and soon the Marauders were far from Old Fool’s Manor.

 

Hogwarts Castle

The following days… getting more antsy by the second

The next day, as the Marauders walked dejectedly to the Great Hall for breakfast, James could only think of Lily Evans and how much he had hoped to impress her. Their relationship… oh, all right, their friendship, and he might as well add “fragile”, so… Their fragile friendship was everything to him and he didn’t want to disappoint her. Year after year, the Marauders had built up a reputation with their Halloween parties; James needed that one to be the best.

“You know,” Sirius told him, breaking in his dark mood, “I don’t think Lily would have been impressed if you’d asked her to sneak out of the castle, even on Halloween.”

James nodded and grunted his assent. Of course, Sirius was right! He brightened up immediately – they still had a little more than a week to find something to do inside Hogwarts.

He was in such a better mood that he could ignore Snape’s suspicious look when they entered the Great Hall. Snivellus had probably noticed their absence at dinner the night before and he would do his best to catch them “red-handed”. Well, James wished him good luck. He went to sit next to Lily, who greeted him with a warm smile.

Hidden in the mist, the Marauders were sitting by the lake to throw ideas for their party when James felt something in his pocket. It was a round thing, almost the size of a golden snitch. Frowning, he took it out and swore under his breath.

“What’s that?” Peter asked, looking at what he was holding.

“No idea,” James replied, truthfully. He remembered picking the ball from its stand the night before but not to have pocketed it. It was… it was right before… “I think I held this when Sirius attempted murder on me and I must have put it in my pocket by mistake.” He shrugged.

“If I’d wanted to kill you, you’d be dead,” Sirius remarked drily.

James turned to him and grinned; Sirius grinned back.

“A Black never misses, I know.”

They all laughed.

“What you’re gonna do with it?” Peter asked James, who shrugged again.

“I don’t know… I don’t think it has any use.”

He looked closely at the silver ball and noticed engravings on it. “Look at that!” he exclaimed.

Each in turn, they studied it, passing it from hands to hands.

“Maybe it’s cursed,” Remus surmised.

Peter, who still held the orb, paled.

“Yeah, and seeing the guy’s obsession with nuts, I wouldn’t keep it in my pocket, if I were you…” Sirius added drily.

Peter let the orb fall to the ground. The other three chuckled and James retrieved it.

“The guy was a Muggle, Wormtail,” he reminded his friend. “There can’t be any magic involved.”

And to prove Peter it was safe, he put the ball back into his pocket and they forgot about it.

Peter couldn’t sleep. Unlike his friends, he wasn’t in a state of near panic because it was October 30 already and they couldn’t find a truly amazing theme for their Halloween “party”. He didn’t have a girl to impress, after all. Maybe if they hadn’t done so well the years before, they wouldn’t be stressing over it now. They seemed to have already used all the coolest ideas a Wizard could ever have. The life of a Marauder wasn’t easy at times - they always had to do better and better.

No, Peter couldn’t sleep because of something else entirely.

He’d try to forget about the orb James had taken back from the manor – he’d really try. Hard, really. But he couldn’t.

It was like it was calling to him.

He could see it, laying on James’ bedside table, reflecting the moonlight. It looked almost innocent in its silvery-ness… He’d been wary of it at first, but James had been walking around with it for the last week and he was fine.

It was calling to him with the promise that he would discover its use. Or maybe it wasn’t, maybe Peter was imagining things and he was just curious. He tried not to think of the saying - curiosity was healthy for a Marauder.

Peter listened to his friends breathing - they were finally asleep. He quietly got up and tip-toed to James’ bedside. When James suddenly turned around and faced him, mumbling something unintelligible, Peter almost cried out. His heart racing, he picked the orb and went back to his bed. There, under the covers, he studied the Muggle object, tapped it with his wand whispering: “Revelio.” He knew James had done it already, but… well, you never know, right?

Of course, nothing happened. Peter was rather disappointed - he had truly hoped to be the one revealing the true nature of the silvery ball.

Somewhere in the castle, a clock rang - midnight - and Peter turned his head towards the sound. And from the corner of his eyes, he thought he could see the writings on the orb burn with a purplish light. He let go of it and jumped out of his bed. The orb fell to his feet - there was no light.

“I’m imagining things again,” he mumbled.

Dejected, Peter climbed back into his bed, hid the orb under his pillow and fell asleep.

 

Hogwarts Castle (they can’t sneak out, remember?)

Halloween… at last!

Remus was the first to get up the next morning. He yawned hugely and saw James sitting on his bed and putting on his glasses and Sirius stretching in his. He turned to Peter’s bed to see whether he too was waking up, but Peter wasn’t there.

“Looks like our little Wormtail was hungry this morning,” Sirius remarked. “Still, he could have waited for us.”

“Yeah, I wonder what’s been wrong with him lately,” James observed, frowning.

Remus only shrugged - he had no idea and wasn’t one to talk when he didn’t have anything to say, especially less than a week after the full moon.

“Well, I’m hungry too,” James added. ‘Let’s join him.”

They got clothed in a hurry and headed to the Great Hall. It was Halloween, it was a Sunday… in other words, it was perfect!

The whole school was at breakfast - the whole school, but still no Peter.

“This is so… unlike him,” Sirius said, his eyes darting from one corner of the big hall to another and resting suspiciously on the Slytherin table.

“He still has that History of Magic paper to write,” James surmised. “He probably got up early and went to the library. We must have missed him.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

Remus nodded and kept on wolfing down his food. People often wonder how he could eat so much and yet remain so thin. Well, they should try the werewolf diet - during three days, every month, he couldn’t eat at all and he couldn’t rest, he howled and growled, bit and scratched himself, paced and threw himself against the walls and doors. There was never a time off, not even one second, when a werewolf was driven by its instincts.

Peter opened his eyes slowly, wondering whether he was the first to wake up - the room was unusually quiet. He sat in his bed and looked around, and he frowned. Where had Remus, James and Sirius gone? They should have tried to wake him up!

Unhappy, he got dressed and ran to the Great Hall.

His friends were at the Gryffindor table. James was talking to Lily and making her laugh. Sirius was eating with a bored expression on his handsome face. And Remus was pigging out, as he always did less than a week after a full moon.

“Hey, guys! Thanks for waiting for me,” he said, sarcastic, sitting down next to Remus.

They all ignored him. Not even one of them looked his way, much less say “hello!”.

Peter wondered whether they knew he had borrowed James’ Muggle orb the night before and were angry…

“Where’s Peter, by the way?” Lily asked.

Her words took him by surprise. He would never have believed Lily would accept to play that kind of tricks. She was… she was always so nice and sweet!

“Probably at the library. He has an History of Magic paper to write,” James answered.

“Looks like he got up extra early to work on it,” added Remus.

“Oh, come on, guys!” Peter said in an exasperated tone. “Can’t you at least make up a more believable scenario? I still have a whole week to work on that one!”

Peter thought they would remind him for the umpteenth time that procrastinating was bad, and he would reply that his mind just worked like that, that he needed to feel the pressure of time to give his best. But they didn’t say a word.

“Guess we should go to the library,” Sirius offered.

They all nodded, and James took leave of Lily with obvious reluctance.

Peter turned to the redhead. “Lily, I don’t know what they told you to convince you to ignore me but I swear I didn’t do anything!” It was stretching the truth a little bit… oh, ok, it was an outright lie, but what he did wasn’t that bad, after all. He didn’t steal the orb, he borrowed it - it wasn’t his fault if he hadn’t thought of returning it as soon as he was done with it. It had been late, very late, after all. And why would James own it? He’d stolen it from the manor they visited, so it wasn’t his to begin with!

But Lily, who was watching James go, didn’t reply.

“Keep on playing your stupid little game, I’m not playing anymore!” Peter burst out. “And I’m going to tell them right away!”

Peter wasn’t in the library. So what was he up to? Sirius wondered. Wormtail knew they still had to plan their party - the Room of Requirement was tricky. It gave you what you required, but you had to be careful how you phrased it.

“Maybe he’s in our room,” James suggested, always the optimist.

They directed their steps towards the Gryffindor Tower.

Peter saw his friends leaving the library from the other end of the corridor and wondered what they had been doing - they knew he wouldn’t be there, didn’t they? He followed them back to their Common Room.

“Look, I’ve had enough,” he started, his voice shaking with suppressed anger. “If anything is at the very opposite of funny, this is! You can’t keep on ignoring me! It’s not fair! I thought you were my best friends…”

“He should be here,” James was saying. “Do any of you remember if he said something about… I don’t know… something he had to do?”

Sirius and Remus shook their heads.

“Stop it!” Peter shouted. “I’m right here and you know it!” He started jumping up and down and waving his arms in front of them, but they had no reactions.

“I didn’t know that our Halloween plans were to run after little Peter,” Sirius remarked drily.

“Let’s go check the Map,” Remus suggested.

They ran up the stairs to their dormitory. James bumped into Peter but didn’t slow down.

Peter fell into step with them. “So that’s you idea of some Halloween fun? Let’s pretend little Peter is not here?”

The other three Marauders had checked they were alone, and James took out their Map and tapped it with his wand. “I solemnly swear I’m up to no good!”

“You know what?” Peter shouted. “I’m tired! I’m out of it!”

“I can’t see Peter,” James said.

Remus and Sirius were already bending over the Map.

“Me neither,” Sirius admitted, a hint of surprise in his voice.

“That’s impossible,” Remus stated, but he sounded unconvinced.

“Of course I’m here…” Peter was looking at the Map, at the square that said “Seventh Year Boy Dormitory”, but though he could see his friends, his name wasn’t there. “No, it can’t be…”

He stepped back and sat hard on his bed, horrified by the implication.

It didn’t help that every one of his friends looked worried too.

They really couldn’t see or hear him.

“The Map must be faulty,” James said. “It’s the only explanation that makes any sense.”

“Yeah, you must be right.” Peter would have liked Sirius to sound more like he really believed his own words. “So, we must find him!”

“Yes! Yes!” Peter squeaked. “You have to find me, please.”

Remus shook his head. “I don’t know. He’s not on the map anymore…”

He didn’t have to finish his sentence.

“Let’s get out of here!” James decided. “I can’t seem to be able to think in here right now.”

They went back downstairs.

“Have you found Peter?” Lily asked them, then she noticed his absence and added: “You left Peter in the library? I’m sure he needs help with his homework!”

“Aw, Lily, you’re so sweet,” Peter sobbed. 

She turned to leave; James gently took her by the arm to stop her. “He’s not in the library, Lily.”

“So, where…” Lily seemed to notice their serious faces. “What’s wrong?”

Obviously, James debated with himself before answering her question.

“He’s gone… missing,” Sirius said. “We can’t find him anywhere.”

“It can’t be that bad,” the redhead answered, then she seemed to think about it and added, “but it’s true it’s always the four of you, always…” She looked at them all in turn. “People don’t disappear from Hogwarts just like that, you know.”

“Of course not! I’m still here,” Peter chimed in, wiping his tears with his sleeve.

James thought Lily had never looked prettier than at this moment, as she was trying to give them hope. When she added, “I’ll help you find him”, he knew he was in love more than ever.

Sirius and Remus exchanged a look; Remus shrugged.

“Let’s go!” he pressed them.

Realizing they trusted Lily, James felt his throat tighten.

“Where to?” Lily asked, falling in step with him.

While James was clearing his throat, Remus remarked, “We should split.”

“I’ll go with Remus,” Sirius decided, “and Lily, you go with James.”

And so they went from room to staircases to corridor, asking about Peter to every student, teacher, portraits and ghost they met in their search. They had to phrase their questions very carefully, especially with the professors. They had to duck inside dusty rooms and secret passageways to hide from Peeves and Argus Filch. Once, they even went down a trap in the floor.

Of course, no one had seen Peter.

At first, Lily had had doubts, but now she knew that their “Peter’s missing” scenario was their idea of a perfect Halloween. So she played the part - if James could play his so well, she had to do her best too.

She had to admit that the search itself was exhilarating! Lily was finally willing to have an insight into the life of James Potter… and she enjoyed every second of it.

She’d thought she knew the castle well, but with him, she discovered rooms she would have never thought existed, like that amazing Room of Requirement.

Finally, just before the feast, they all met at the doors of the Great Hall. When Sirius and Remus shook their heads, James sighed and grimaced, and Lily took her cue from him.

She thought Peter would be waiting for them at the Gryffindor table… but he wasn’t.

The Marauders had eaten too much at the feast, but then boys always think better with a full stomach. They were the first to go back to their room, each of them trying not to look at Peter’s empty bed.

“We must have missed something, anything…” Remus said, pacing. “A clue… The last time we saw Wormtail, he was asleep.”

They all crowded around his bed.

Remus took a peek under it but found only a couple of cobwebs, a dirty sock and dust bunnies.

“And he was gone this morning,” James added, bending over to look at the bedspread.

“We have to find out what happened to him during the night,” Sirius finished, squatting to look at the pillowcase.

“I’m sorry I thought you could be ignoring me like that, mates!” Peter squeaked, and tears sprang to his eyes.

Suddenly, Sirius turned into a big black dog and sniffed the pillow, then back again into his human self he picked something from it. “Cat’s hair.”

“What?” Peter whined.

“You’re kidding, right?” James said, pushing his glasses up his nose.

Remus shook his head. “No, I can smell it from here.” He shrugged, then his shoulders sagged. “Poor Peter…”

James’ and Sirius’ faces betrayed the horror of the whole scene.

“Somehow he turned into a rat in his sleep…” Sirius said.

“The cat smelled him and attacked, right under our noses…” Remus added.

“Hold on! It doesn’t mean a thing,” James said, but his tone wasn’t really as optimistic as it generally was. “There’s no blood… and I think cats never eat their whole prey, so there should be some…”

It was obvious he couldn’t bring himself to say it.

Peter had left then. He couldn’t bear staying and hear what had happened to him.

He was dead.

He was a ghost…

He saw Nearly-Headless Nick float his way.

“How do you like it to be a ghost?”

But the Gryffindor ghost ignored him too.

Peter kept on walking in the dark halls and met Moaning Myrtle, but she couldn’t see or hear him either, and he wondered how much time one had to be a ghost to become visible to other ghosts.

He felt so lonely.

The only good thing was… it hadn’t hurt to die. One moment he was alive and awake, and the next he was dead.

He was almost back to the Gryffindor Tower when he heard a clock - it was midnight.

Peter was tired, so tired, so he climbed the stairs to his dormitory… and saw his friends turned their heads at his entrance and gape at him.

“Where have you been all day?” Remus exclaimed.

Remus… What…?

“We’ve been searching for you for hours!” Sirius added, punching him in the arm.

“You can see me?” Peter squeaked, swallowing back tears of relief.

“Well, of course we can see you, duh!” James rolled his eyes.

“But earlier, you couldn’t, and you said I was dead so I thought I was too…”

And Peter told them the whole story.

The next day at breakfast, Lily grinned at Peter and walked to James. She kissed him on his cheeks and whispered: “Thank you, it was the best Halloween, ever!”


End file.
